Home-built hero ‘P7’ steals Desert Race spotlight
Friday, July 10, 2026 | 180 Views |
On a roll: The P7. PIC: PHATSIMO KAPENG
Driving a buggy he built with his own hands, the Makaleng native battled punctures, mechanical breakdowns, fuel shortages and Botswana’s unforgiving terrain to complete the gruelling three-day Sarona 1000 Desert Race, proving that passion can keep pace with machines built on far bigger budgets.
Maruapula competed in the Class P category during the Sarona 1000 Desert Race, which doubled as rounds two and three of the Botswana Off-Road Racing Championship (BORRC). He lined up against 32 entries, many of them professionally engineered race cars from Botswana, South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe.
Our weekly edition carries painful articles of people being murdered. Whilst some are classified as Gender Based Violence (GBV), there are still a large percentage of murder cases, which often happen at drinking spots, after people are heavily intoxicated. We have in the past carried articles where an individual was murdered because they refused to give someone a cigarette, and sadly this is where we are at now!In this very edition, there is an...